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President-elect Obama gave his first press conference today after meeting with his team of economic advisers. Those of us watching on live TV had the pleasure of watching the Dow shed over one hundred points on the bottom of the screen as he spoke. For those of you who missed it, here’s what you need to know: If Congress doesn’t push a stimulus package before inauguration, it will be Obama’s top priority; preserving the auto industry is another priority; Obama does not know who will succeed him in the Senate; no new cabinet announcements; and the family wants to adopt a shelter dog, but Malia is allergic, so it’s tricky.
CNN Money has the stats on our shrinking economy, just in time for the holiday season. 1.2 million jobs have been lost so far in 2008, including 240,000 in October. It's the first time the economy has lost one million jobs in a year since 2001. The unemployment rate, now at 6.5 percent, is at its highest since March 1994. Losses are expected to continue through, at the very least, the first half of 2009. Happy shopping!
In August, we learned from The New York Times Magazine that George W. Bush planned on writing a memoir and was “settling” on a ghostwriter. He might not want to sharpen his pencils just yet. The Canadian Press interviews several publishing executives and finds not a one salivating for Bush: My White House Years. “Certainly, the longer he waits, the better,” says Marji Ross, publisher of the conservative outfit Regnery. Ross goes on to add that Regnery will focus on (more) anti-Obama screeds. In Bush’s favor: Richard Nixon became a prolific and best-selling author after his political demise.
Mitch McConnell has reportedly offered Joe Lieberman a seat in the Republican caucus. Lieberman is weighing that offer, which includes no high-ranking committee slots, against Majority Leader Harry Reid’s offer, which would strip Lieberman of his Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs chairmanship, but would: a) keep him in the Democratic Caucus, b) allow him to retain his seniority, and c) give him the chairmanship of something else. “That, by any reasonable measure,” Steve Benen writes at Political Animal, “is ridiculously gracious of Reid.” And yet Lieberman has termed it “unacceptable.” With their majority now cemented, “the fact remains that Democrats don't really need him. He has no leverage.” Rather than cave to Lieberman, the Democrats might be better off by letting him walk.
The recession is hitting Orange County, and its residents should prepare to trade in their supercars for something a bit more compact. Lamborghini O.C., the world’s largest Lamborghini dealer, has closed. The dealership previously sold about 10 percent of the 2,400 Lamborghinis made each year. Its owners are refusing to say why they shut their doors. Overall Lamborghini sales are down 15 percent so far this year.
Those of you who just couldn’t have enough of the half-hour Obama infomercial can look forward to a feature-length production in 2009. According to Variety, HBO has paid “low seven figures” for the rights to air an Ed Norton-produced Barack Obama documentary that's been in the works for two years. Filmmakers Amy Rice and Alicia Sams have followed Obama and his family, friends, and staff throughout the election. Spotlights include his 2006 trip to Africa, the campaign announcement, and the upcoming inauguration. Norton believes the film "will capture a tipping point in American history, when a new generation of leadership emerged and old prejudices were finally vaulted over."
Ever looked at one of President Bush’s political appointees and thought to yourself, “I could do a way better job than that guy”? Now’s your chance! Via The Stump, we find that Obama’s new website, Change.gov, allows you to apply for appointments in the Obama-Biden administration. Better prepare for your interview though, since “some positions will require Senate confirmation.” Should you decide to apply, a word of warning: We hear your new boss, Rahm Emanuel, is supposed to be a real ball buster.
California’s Governator may soon have competition in the celebrity executive department. Cindy Adams confirms today that Val Kilmer is mulling a run for governor of New Mexico. “Well, it’s sort of true,” Kilmer said by cellphone from Bulgaria. “I really love my state. Poor hardworking decent people … I’ve always thought of myself as functioning as a candidate for them.” He claims to have the blessing of Bill Richardson, who hopes to bolt the Land of Enchantment for Obama’s Cabinet. Which means the man who once played Batman would be governing in the same region as the man who once played Mr. Freeze. Could the Union possibly survive?
So Microsoft has apparently moved on from its fling earlier this year with Yahoo. The same week that Google kicked Yahoo to the curb, Microsoft's CEO Steve Ballmer said that his company would not be making any new bids for the struggling internet search engine. Yahoo rebuked a takeover attempt by Microsoft earlier this year, but Yahoo came back to Microsoft after antitrust laws scared Google away. "To this day, I would say that the best thing for Microsoft to do is to buy Yahoo," said Yahoo's cofounder. Microsoft's refusal to bite places Yahoo, says the Financial Times, at a "strategic dead-end."
Joe Biden, meet your maker. A day after Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi complimented Barack Obama on his "tan," The Daily Telegraph has assembled a greatest gaffes list for the man who once called Italians who voted against him "dickheads." On Italian history: "Mussolini never killed anyone. Mussolini used to send people on vacation in internal exile"; on his career: "I don't need to go into office for the power. I have houses all over the world, stupendous boats, beautiful aeroplanes, a beautiful wife, a beautiful family. I am making a sacrifice"; and on business: "Another reason to invest in Italy is that we have beautiful secretaries – superb girls."
North Korea recently released a photo of Kim Jong Il among a cadre of soldiers, meant to prove that their Dear Leader, who has been surrounded by rumors of illness, is alive and well. Except … Why do all the soldiers' shadows slant at an angle when Kim Jong Il's doesn't? And why does the thin black line running behind their legs disappear mysteriously behind his? Many think the photos are digitally altered so that Kim could send Barack Obama a message of "Hey, I'm still here!" If Kim recently suffered a stroke, as has been rumored, the photos would mean he enjoyed a remarkably quick recovery.
America might not have to wait until 2012 for Sarah Palin to return to national politics. Should Senator/convicted felon Ted Stevens win reelection, he will be expelled from the Senate, putting Gov. Palin in a position to appoint herself to his seat. Palin would, however, have to run for the seat in a special election within 90 days of her appointment due to an Alaskan law. At this point, the possibility of Sen. Palin is pure speculation, but you can bet there are members of the press praying it comes to pass.
There’s a considerable amount of speculation about what role Katie Holmes plays in her marriage to Tom Cruise. So naturally one’s ears perk up when the previous Mrs. Cruise, Nicole Kidman, talks about life with her ex-husband. Kidman tells Glamour (as reported by The New York Post): "I felt I became a star only by association. I didn't think [my early movies] were very good, which is why I would always cower in the background. I thought, I don't deserve to be here. We would go to the Oscars, and I would think, I'm here to support him. I felt it was my job to put on a beautiful dress and to be seen and not heard."
Just three weeks ago, Minnesota representative Michelle Bachmann was on Hardball telling Chris Matthews that Barack Obama might have “anti-American” views. Despite the ensuing brouhaha—in which Bachmann’s opponent raised over $1 million and launched a spirited challenge for her seat—Bachmann won re-election. She also seems to have had a change of heart. Speaking with Politico, Bachmann says she was “extremely grateful that we have an African-American who has won this year.” She also emphasized her hope that “this will send a national signal across our country that America is not a nation made up of racists.”
Something to look forward to in 2010: Film production will begin on Salman Rushdie's classic novel, Midnight's Children. Twice selected as the best of all the Booker Prize winning novels, Midnight's Children's screenplay will be written by Rushdie and Deep Mehta, who is also set to direct. Her oeuvre includes Water, Earth, and Fire. Many have long considered the novel, about children with superpowers in post-Independence India, unfilmable, but Mehta said that Rushdie's cooperation should eliminate any concern. They will begin the screenplay in March.
Call him the Teflon John. This afternoon the U.S. Attorney in Manhattan announced the former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer won’t face charges for paying for sex with a high-end hooker. The investigators found no evidence that Spitzer had used public money or campaign funds to pay for the services, and declared that a full prosecution would not be “in the public interest,” according to U.S. Attorney Michael J. Garcia. But Garcia wouldn’t say whether the overall investigation is over and done with for good. In a statement, Spitzer responded to the announcement: “I appreciate the impartiality and thoroughness of the investigation by the U.S. attorney’s office, and I acknowledge and accept responsibility for the conduct it disclosed.”
In his later years, the writer David Halberstam was no one’s idea of a security risk. But it wasn’t so early on: News broke yesterday that the FBI kept a dossier on the Halberstam from the 1960s up until the late 1980s. Halberstam apparently came to the bureau’s attention because of a 1965 letter—now heavily redacted—that cast suspicions on his activities. Halberstam was covering Poland for The New York Times, and had married a Polish actress. The FBI later determined there was “no derogatory information” on Halberstam, and suggested the letter might be the work of an enemy.
It’s a bit premature to chisel Obama’s countenance into Mount Rushmore, but the renaming of the landscape in his honor has begun elsewhere. If you happen to be in Antigua and Barbuda, check out its highest peak, which, Prime Minister W. Baldwin Spencer announced in a congratulatory letter, has been renamed Mount Obama. “In lasting tribute to your election,” Spencer wrote, “I shall take immediate measures for Antigua and Barbuda’s highest mountain peak to be dedicated in your honor.”
Here's some math you probably haven't seen before: Bill Clinton + Ronald Reagan + Vladimir Putin = Barack Obama? That's what Charles Krauthammer says in his first post-election column, paying the president-elect a compliment after sneering at conservatives who hitched their wagon to his ticket during the campaign. "With him we get a president with the political intelligence of a Bill Clinton harnessed to the steely self-discipline of a Vladimir Putin. (I say this admiringly.) With these qualities, Obama will now bestride the political stage as largely as did Reagan." Krauthammer goes on to write that Obama ran a "brilliant general election campaign," with a "tactically perfect minimalism," and when the financial crisis hit, "he understood that all he had to do was get out of the way."
Was the Russian-Georgian war really the act of unilateral Russian aggression it was portrayed to be? According to a New York Times story, several new factors complicate Georgia's excuse that it was acting defensively against Russian and separatist aggression. Georgia claimed to be reacting to the shelling of several Georgian villages by Southern Ossetian separtists, but according to observers "no shelling of Georgian villages could be heard in the hours before the Georgian bombardment." Georgia also claimed that its response was a "precise operation," but "accounts suggest that Georgia's inexperienced military attacked … with indiscriminate artillery and rocket fire, exposing civilians, Russian peacekeepers, and unarmed monitors to harm." The Georgian government has denied the accusations.
The Republican Party typically moves to the right after defeat. Hence, Reagan after Nixon and Ford, and Gingrich after Bush. Will it work again? In today's New York Times, Ramesh Ponnuru writes "moving right will work only if moderates are given a reason to move right too." The key is not "moving to the middle" but "moving to the middle class." John McCain "somehow believed that he could win a presidential election without a coherent middle-class economic agenda, and conservatives never thought to demand one from him." His campaign abandoned discussions of his innovative, conservative health care policy for insinuations about Bill Ayers. In the end, 60 percent of voters believed that McCain was not "in touch with people like them."
Barack Obama's challenges as president will be manifold, but the fact of his election takes care of a big one. "The strategic threat to US power has come from rising anti-Americanism," Philip Stephens writes in the Financial Times. "The election of Barack Obama has disarmed it." But the world should not regard Obama's election as a handout. In fact, it challenges the world to play a more active role in world affairs than it has in the previous eight years. "Mr. Bush has been an excuse for inaction," Stephens writes. "That excuse is gone. Before too long, these governments, long too comfortable in their inaction, will have to consider what they have to offer the incoming president in return for America's security guarantees."
Something is fishy in Alaska. While other states reported record turnouts, the Last Frontier’s turnout was surprisingly low, and two troubled lawmakers—convicted felon Ted Stevens and currently-under-investigation Congressman Don Young—were both reelected. While final numbers have not yet been reported, turnout is supposed to be less than both 2004 and 2000, which is odd given that their native daughter, Sarah Palin, was on one of the tickets. Fueling suspicion is the fact that pre-election polls were way off—one poll showed Stevens losing by 22 points. Some say that McCain’s early concession speech might have caused Alaskan voters to stay home even though their polls had not yet closed, but others say that Stevens’ and Young’s races were high-profile enough to keep turnout high.
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